Guests of Honour

Ayako Kawasumi is a Japanese voice actress and J-pop singer. She is also a very good pianist, she composed and performed the piano opening theme of the anime Piano, '...To You'. She sang for many Character CDs such as Mahoromatic and Zero no Tsukaima and performed for the theme song of Mahoromatic as well. Her career debuted in 1997 with a small role in You're Under Arrest, but she is now one of Japan's most popular voice actresses.

While Ayako gave voice to hundreds of characters, her most famous role is definitely Saber from Fate/Stay Night and Fate/Zero, whom she has been for around 10 years already. She went over all the different changes in that character and has come to love her as much as the public has. Aside from the Fate series, Kawasumi also voiced Megumi Noda from Nodame Cantabile, Mahoro Ando from Mahoromatic, Lafiel from Crest of the Stars, Natsuki Mogi from Initial D, Fu from Samurai Champloo and Elie from Rave Master. Last year, she even voice acted in the popular anime Assassination Classroom as the character Aguri Yukimura.

Aside from anime and film characters, Kawasumi can also be heard in many video games. She voiced Leona from the Japanese version of League of Legends, Lion Ushiromiya from Umineko no Naku Koro ni and, of course, Saber from the Fate series.

Throughout her career, Ayako Kawasumi was invited to many conventions in the states, but it will be her first time in Montreal. She looks forward to having a good time at Otakuthon!

From voicing Cherche and Sully, the knight nicknamed "The Woman to End All Men" in Nintendo's Fire Emblem: Awakening, to filling bad guys with arrows as the Marvel superhero Kate Bishop/Hawkeye, and losing her ever-loving mind as Junko Enoshima and Toko Fukawa in the Danganronpa video game series,Amanda Miller is best known for playing spunky, badass, and occasionally deranged heroines (and villains) in anime and video games.

You can currently hear her as Sailor Jupiter in the Viz dub of Sailor Moon and Sailor Moon Crystal, as Boruto Uzumaki in Boruto: Naruto the Movie, Mikage in Durarara!!x2, Menchi in Hunter x Hunter, and as Ride in Gundam Iron Blooded Orphans on Toonami.

She also plays the character of Jade and is the creator, writer, and producer of the paranormal comedy mockumentary series Ghosts 'n Stuff Inc. on YouTube.

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Cherami Leigh has been in the industry for 20 years as a voice actor, an actor and a creator. While Leigh's voice can be heard in many children programs as a series regular on the Sprout hit Zou, a lead role in the animated feature Ribbit, a guest star on Doc McStuffins or as Peanut Big Top in the La LaLoopsy Girls, her most important contribution is in the anime industry. She is the voice of Lucy in Fairy Tail, Asuna in Sword Art Online, Road in D. Grayman, Lizzie in Black Butler, Mai in Ghost Hunt, and Patty in Soul Eater. She will also be playing Sailor Venus in Sailor Moon, Mika in Psycho Pass, Kajun in BlazBlue and Komaru Naegi in the latest installment of the DanganRonpa series.

She has also worked on over 20 video games, including Borderlands 2, in which she plays the popular DLC, Gaige. As an actor, Cherami Leigh starred in Shane Dawson's "Not Cool" and the Starz Original Series "The Chair." She has also appeared in the Emmy Award Winning Temple Grandin and other movies such as, to name a few, Friday Night Lights, The Deep End, Chase, Shameless, Bones and Longmire. She also stars in the recently released faith based drama Beyond the Farthest Star. You can also spot her in over 75 commercials!

Leigh finally worked on feature-length films like Fast Food Nation with Richard Linklater, The Hottest State with Ethan Hawke and The Mist with Frank Darabont. She even produced two seasons of the award winning web seriesThrowing Stones in which she is also an actress. She has many other projects in various states of production which she is excited to share!

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Eric Roth is known for an original and expressive musical personality. He is recognized internationally as an orchestrator, arranger, conductor, composer, and producer. Roth is a primary orchestrator and arranger for Distant Worlds: music from FINAL FANTASY, the internationally acclaimed live orchestra concert production, as well as a recording artist for A New World: intimate music from FINAL FANTASY, the chamber ensemble concert production. His orchestrations and arrangements have been performed by the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Houston Symphony Orchestra, and many others.

In 2016 the Pat Benatar/Neil Giraldo orchestra production launched with the Pittsburg Symphony. Roth was the primary arranger and orchestrator for this project. In 2011, he was the orchestrator and Associate Producer for Mannheim Steamroller Christmas Symphony and alsofor 2013's follow-up recording. In 2014,Roth was the co-producer and the main orchestrator/arranger for A New World: intimate music from FINAL FANTASY - Live in London release. Roth was also the co-music director of A New World, and he directed directingthe production as a conductor in numerous North American and Australian cities. He was also the conductor for the "Surprise, Oprah! A Farewell Spectacular" at the United Center(Chicago) in 2011, for a list of performers that includes Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, Patti Labelle, Usher, Kristin Chenoweth, Jamie Foxx and Josh Groban.

Roth has regularly worked as conductor and orchestrator for live performances by chart-topping singer and songwriter John Ondrasik/Five For Fighting. He worked as a conductor for performances by the Utah Symphony Orchestra, KMH Symphony Orchestra (Stockholm, Oslo) and orchestras/ensembles with artists such as Seal, Jewel and Stevie Nicks.

He recently created original music for the documentary film Baseball's Been Very, Very Good to Me: The Minnie Minoso Story, Curious George's Dictionary application for mobile devices and other applications by Scrollmotion. He has recorded his own recording of minimal percussion music Battery, Lyceum for Percussion Ensemble and solo recitation, Marquette, Michigan, The Clark Street Bridge Project for 80-plus percussionists for the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs,and Secret Cheese for the Tate Modern, London. etc.

Roth has taught at the Brooklyn College Conservatory of Music (New York), at Boston University (Distance Ed.) and at other institutions. ABD for a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in music composition at The Graduate Center (City University of New York), Roth holds a MA from Mills College and a BA from the University of Michigan. His composition teachers include Tania Leon and Alvin Curran.

"IA" is a virtual artist brought to life as part of the VOCALOIDTM3 library "IA -ARIA ON THE PLANETES-" and "IA ROCKS -ARIA ON THE PLANETES-", which are both ranked #1 on the Amazon Japan Music Software chart. IA-related videos have collectively garnered more than 100 million views.

In 2013 and 2014, IA took on the official theme song and became the spokescharacter for Super GT, the most watched motor race show in Japan. IA is also the featured singer of "KAGEROU PROJECT", a multi-content project created by the multi-talented "JIN". She also provided vocals for a song which was entitled "Otsukimi Recital", appearing in the internationally distributed anime MEKAKUCITY ACTORS based on "KAGEROU PROJECT". In addition, IA received attention for being selected for the vocals on the CD included with the final volume of the Neon Genesis EVANGELION manga. In July 2015, "IA/VT -COLORFUL-" for PlayStation® Vita was released and ranked #2 on the game chart.

IA made her North American live performance debut with more than 2,000 screaming fans in July 2015 as part of the Cool Japan Festival presented by ANIME EXPO 2015 at Club Nokia, L.A. Live. In September 2015, IA completed her first solo concert in Japan titled "IA First Live Concert in JAPAN -PARTY A GO-GO-" at AKASAKA BLITZ. In October 2015, IA held her first one-man live performance in New York, and it was a big success. In November 2015, IA had two showcases at HYPER JAPAN in London, in front of an audience of 1,500 people in two days.

IA celebrated her 3rd anniversary on January 27th together with the 1st anniversary of ONE in the "IA & ONE ANNIVERSARY PARTY!! -SPECIAL TALK & LIVE-" streamed live in Japan.

Kara Eberle is an American voice actress and Internet personality. She's most known for her role as Weiss Schnee in the award-winning anime series RWBY. Kara first stepped into the industry working at Rooster Teeth Productions, where she met Monty Oum (RWBY) in 2011. They became close friends, and Oum shared a "crazy idea" that would turn out to be a global phenomenon. Warner Bros. Japan recently debuted RWBY to the eastern market in late 2015.

Kara also lends her voice to the new video game RWBY: Grimm Eclipse, introduced at RTX 2015 and currently available on Steam.

In addition to voice acting and interacting with fans, Kara works as an executive at Powerhouse Animation Studios, located in Austin, TX. She enjoys seeing all aspects of the animation world! You can find her on Twitter and Instagram.

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Kevin M. Connolly is an actor who has been performing in theater, voice over and tv/film for over twenty five years. He is classically trained, holding his BA in theater and MFA in acting, has been an acting instructor for middle school, high school and college level students, stage managed a national musical tour out of New York that performed in thirty-five states and Canada in four months, has been a theatrical set and light designer, stage technician, stage manager and director, and continues to perform for various theatres in Los Angeles.

His voice-over and anime career started in 2004 on Case Closed, where he was cast in his first recurring role of Harley Hartwell. This was followed by one of his favorite roles, the adorkable Sergeant Major Kain Fuery in Fullmetal Alchemist. Since then, he has voiced characters on over thirty anime and live action foreign film dubs for FUNimation, ADV Films, Illumitoon Ent, and Bang Zoom Entertainment. Some of his favorites are Takayuki Narumi in Rumbling Hearts, Heathcliff in Sword Art Online, Tanaka in BECK, and the dual roles of King Gwanghae and Ha-Sun in Masquerade. His video game works include World of Warcraft, Vladimir in League of Legends, Kald Lau in the just released Atelier Firis: The Alchemist and the Mysterious Journey, and a lead in an upcoming PS4 exclusive in the fall of 2017. He has also done voice work in commercials, industrial corporate projects, documentary narration, visual novels, and currently is a narrator and sound designer for a children's audio book company where he has recorded over three hundred audio books, articles, non-fiction books and plays.

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As the story goes, half-man, half-wolf band MAN WITH A MISSION (マンウィズアミッション) thawed out of icy coffins in 2010 and tore through the world with a feral rock ‘n’ roll energy on par with that of Godzilla. They are made up of five band members: Tokyo Tanaka (vocals), Kamikaze Boy (bass), Jean-Ken Johnny (guitar), DJ Santa Monica (disc jockey), and Spear Rib (drums).

In addition to their progressive sound and connection to some of the most popular animes like Nanatsu no Taizai (Seven Deadly Sins), Log Horizon and Mobile Suit Gundam: Iron-Blooded Orphans, the band became an international phenomenon in their own right when they released their latest album, The World's On Fire, in 2016. Produced by the legendary Don Gilmore [Linkin Park, Korn] and featuring collaborations with ††† (Crosses)’ Shaun Lopez [Deftones, Lupe Fiasco], the record clawed its way to #1 on iTunes and sold 200K copies in less than two months. Since their emergence, they’ve taken a bite out of world-renowned festivals such as FUJI ROCK, SUMMER SONIC, Knotfest, and more, in addition to touring with Rise Against. Slipknot DJ Sid Wilson shared the stage with these animals during a sold-out show at the Roxy in Hollywood and lent his remixing talents to the song “Distance”.

MAN WITH A MISSION will be performing at Otakuthon 2017 on Saturday, August 5th. This is their second time in Canada, but their first time in Quebec. This appearance is in association with J-rock North Promotions Inc.

TWIN cosplay is a cosplay duo from Mexico formed by Shema Arroyo and his partner Juan Carlos Tolento. They started cosplaying two years ago, and are also cosmakers and propmakers specializing in the creation of characters and props for publicity campaigns and special events.

"For us, Cosplay is truly a passion, but more specifically, it is an art with the challenge to make the impossible become reality. In other words, we think of it as the art of making dreams true. It is truly a unique and personal challenge, as well as an adventure where one discovers that nothing is impossible as long as someone loves what they do enough for their passion to take them through any challenge just to create their art.

We are focused on continuing to grow as artists because Cosplay has become our full-time passion, and that's why we are committed to it completely. Even though we are aware that one never stops learning new things, and that we still have so much more to learn, we feel really blessed that in these two years and a half since the start of this journey, we have achieved so much and have received support from so many people, friends and other artists to do so. Thank you!"

Within this time period, TWIN cosplay has been considered one of the best cosplayers in their country, and they have been invited to several events in Mexico, as well as in international conventions around Latin America, Europe, Asia and the United States. They have also participated in several national and international competitions, the biggest one being the WORLD COSPLAY SUMMIT CHAMPIONSHIP 2015 where their dream to bring home the FIRST PLACE as WORLD GRAND CHAMPIONS came true!

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WindoftheStars, a.k.a. Mel Hoppe, is a veteran internationally known cosplayer based in Northern Nevada. She has been cosplaying since 2004 and has made over 100 costumes inspired by video games, animes, comics, and of her own creative design. Many of her costumes have won prestigious awards at cosplay competitions since 2007. Her costume works have been featured on TV, as a judge on Call to Cosplay (aired on Crunchyroll and Myx TV), in print in Cosmode, OtakuUSA and Mangabomb, and in several web publications such as CNET, Nerdist, TokyoPOP and Kotaku. She has also worked with 2K Games, Jo-Ann Fabric and Craft Stores, iLoveToCreate, IGG/I Got Games and more, on promotional events, contests and costume collaborations. Aside from making costumes for herself, she has made and designed costumes for her local theater group and had the honor to make Game of Thrones costumes for George R. R. Martin. As a veteran in the cosplay community, she strives to spread the sense of belonging to the community, to help her fellow cosplayers, and to promote the art of costume creation through her online presence and guest appearance both in the USA and at an international level.